Components for aerospace, automotive, and like service applications have been subjected to the ever increasing demand for improvement in one or more mechanical properties, such as tensile strength, ductility, fatigue life, resistance to impact damage, etc. while at the same time maintaining or reducing the weight of the component. To this end, the Charbonnier et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,889,177 describes a method of making a composite casting wherein a molten lightweight alloy, such as aluminum or magnesium, is countergravity cast into a gas permeable sand mold having a fibrous insert of high strength ceramic fibers positioned therein by metallic inserts so as to be incorporated into the casting upon solidification of the molten alloy.
The Funatani et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,572,270 describes a method of making a composite casting to this same end wherein a mass of high strength reinforcing material, such as ceramic fibers, whiskers, or powder, is incorporated into a lightweight metal matrix (e.g., aluminum or magnesium) that is die cast around the reinforcing mass in a pressure chamber.
A technique commonly referred to as bicasting has been employed in attempts to improve one or more mechanical properties of superalloy castings for use as aerospace components. Bicasting involves pouring molten metal into a mold cavity in which a preformed insert is positioned in a manner to augment one or more mechanical properties in a particular direction(s). The molten metal surrounds the insert and, upon solidification, yields a composite casting comprising the insert embedded in and hopefully soundly bonded with the cast metal without contamination therebetween. However, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,008,052 attempts at practicing the bicasting process have experienced difficulty in consistently achieving a sound metallurgical bond between the insert and the metal cast therearound without bond contamination. Moreover, difficulty has been experienced in positioning the insert in the mold cavity and thus in the final composite casting within the required location tolerances. The inability to achieve on a reliable and reproducible basis a sound, contamination-free bond between the insert and the cast metal has significantly limited use of bicast components in applications, such as aerospace components, where reliability of the component in service is paramount.